Cat's Cradle
by anenemies
Summary: Eliot, Parker, Lucille, a shoelace, a fire truck, a Red Ryder BB gun and an hour to burn.


If there's one thing Eliot knows it's his body. Down from his toes (index just slightly longer), up over his legs (short but sturdy), his torso (more scarred than he cares to admit), to his hair (he _should_ cut it, it's an easy grab in a fight, but his momma liked it long so...).

He knows every inch of himself intimately, with the kind of knowledge that is born out of years alone with it. He knows that after that last stint in Cape Town, if he lands on his left foot at the wrong angle, on a full sprint he'll throw out his entire hip. He knows that the jagged line of raised, whitish flesh, stretching from the middle of his lower back to his right shoulder blade is particularly sensitive to the sun. He knows that if he's _really_ exhausted, sometimes he'll slip back into his slightly bow-legged stride from his youth.

He knows his hands. Sometimes, late at night, when everything seems, at once, further away, and a little too close, in his mind's eye, he'll see the blood on his hands. But then in the morning, when he's beating eggs to a yellow froth, or spooning batter into the muffin pan, he knows his body is more than that. Still, he knows his body, and himself. He knows what he is, and, what he isn't.

And what he isn't – is delicate.

Parker was staring up at him from under her bangs. Standing they were practically the same height but sitting his torso outstripped hers by a few solid inches. In her hands (paledelicatefragile) was a piece of twine about a two feet long, knotted together to form a circle. She had wrapped it and unwrapped it around her palms for the last half hour.

Normally Hardison would be the one squatting in the van for what seemed like an endless amount of time while the rest of the team ran about. However, this particular con required the tech to be on the inside, in the central hub of the building to be exact. So, Parker having finished her portion, and Eliot, waiting for (an inevitable) problem, found themselves with an hour or so to burn in Lucille.

So Parker breaks out the string from (godknows) somewhere and proceeds to play Cat's Cradle. Or something like it. Like the one player version or something. But now he guesses she's bored because she's looking at him all expectantly, hands lifted up as though in supplication, twined round with the loop of string.

Eliot knows his body, and by extension, he knows his hands. Not delicate. Calloused, and thick fingered, and more dextrous as a whole (as an open palm or a closed fist) than as fingers moving deftly through string. Eliot's fairly sure he can remember the basics of the game, the in, out and over his older sister had hammered into his head. But looking at his hands (roughroughrough) then at hers (softsoftsoft)...

"I'm busy." Eliot knows himself and he flatters himself that he knows the others too. Parker should have just given him her crazy scowl and gone back to her piece of string while he focused intently on the computer screen looking fervently at absolutely nothing. Instead, she grabs his hands firmly and slides the string over his fingers.

"I didn't ever have many toys," She shrugged illustratively, wrapping first his left, then his right hand in a loop of string "But a shoelace was nearly always long enough." The thought of Parker growing up without toys created a ball of heat somewhere behind his ribs. They may not have had a lot of money growing up but there were always toys littering the floor of their house, mostly old but some new. She took the middle finger of his left hand and slipped the loop of string on his right hand over, it mirroring the same action to his right hand before pulling both hands until the string grew taut.

"There." And she grinned up at him. Suddenly, Eliot felt the outrageous urge to give Parker his fire truck, or his Superman figurine, or his Red Ryder BB gun because _that_ was Parker would have looked like, would have smiled like, if people hadn't fucked up so badly and given her the toys she deserved. Parker reached over and Eliot gladly averted his eyes from her face to their hands as Parker lifted and pinched the string, twisting her wrist just so, as she formed the second step of the game. Then she was looking at him expectantly again.

So he reached over and picked out the two strings to lay over each of his pinkies and as his hands brushed against Parker's he noted the calluses she had on the pads of her hands and fingers.

(That Christmas Parker received a Barbie Dream House circa 1988. There was no card, but it was tied with shoelace instead of ribbon)


End file.
